Pasta consumption is enjoying a rise in popularity for reasons of health, nutrition, convenience and economy. Home consumers and restauranteurs are therefore in need of a pasta product which is prepared in a very short amount of time without loss of palatability or flavor. Commercially available dry pasta takes 9 to 12 minutes to cook for optimal tenderness. Once cooked, the pasta tends to become sticky and lose a desirable mouth-feel upon standing for any period of time.
Typically, restaurants cook a large batch of pasta in advance and portion it out for single servings, to eliminate the 9- to 12-minute lag time in preparing a customer's meal. The single servings are then kept in a refrigerator, and when needed, each portion is dipped momentarily in boiling water using a colander-type utensil to heat and then drain it and then it is put onto a serving dish. While fast, pasta made in this manner lacks the taste and texture qualities of freshly-cooked pasta.
It is highly desirable to have a pasta product which may be cooked rapidly after exposure to non-boiling water. It is known in the art to prepare microwave cooked pasta. For example, Golden Grain Macaroni Company markets a product which is cookable in warm water. The package directions require placing pasta in warm water; microwaving to boiling; continued boiling for three minutes to absorb water; and flavoring with a cheese sauce. However, the boiled pasta suffers great starch loss and is only palatable when sauce is added to the boiled product to mask its gumminess and starchiness.
Prior art pasta products have additional deficiencies. For example, in the past, a good flavored pasta meal required the addition of a flavor to the cooking water during preparation of the pasta or the addition of a flavoring agent to the pasta after it had been cooked and drained. The addition of a flavoring agent to the cooking water results in a pasta product with a starchy, gummy texture which is highly undesirable. The addition of a flavoring agent or sauce after the pasta has been cooked and drained is just an added, time-consuming step that could be eliminated if a flavoring agent could be incorporated into the pasta dough.
The incorporation of a flavoring agent into pasta dough has been unsuccessfully attempted, as evidenced by Hummel, Macaroni Products Manufacture, Processing and Packaging, Food Trade Press, Ltd., p. 12 (1966). Common flavoring agents are usually fat- or lipid-based, and therefore difficult to incorporate into pasta dough. The lipid-based flavoring agents cause the pasta dough to become discontinuous and break down.
As discussed above, various attempts have also been made to manufacture a pasta product which is susceptible to microwave cooking. U.S. Pat. No. 4,208,439 to Hsu describes an instant pasta product which can be prepared in a micro-wave oven. The Hsu pasta product is capable of microwave preparation because it is formed from a sheet of pregelatinized or precooked cereal flour dough.
A precooked, vacuum-dried alimentary paste is also used to make the casserole composition disclosed by Lawrence et al. in U.S. Pat. No. 3,484,251. The Lawrence casserole composition is capable of preparation in a single cooking operation (although microwave cooking is not specifically disclosed). An alimentary paste tenderizer is used and selected from the group consisting of cysteine, water-soluble cysteine salts and cysteine hydrochloride.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,762,931 to Craig et al. also discloses the use of edible sulfhydryl reducing substances such as cysteine, glutathione and sulfites in alimentary pastes. Craig et al. refer to those sulfhydryl reducing substances as paste-modifying ingredients and claim that mixing and extrusion of the paste is more easily accomplished because less process water is necessary.
The present invention concerns techniques for rapid cooking of a pasta which involves toleration for an initial exposure to room temperature or colder water. The pasta product is pretreated in such a way as to stabilize it against starch leaching in cold water.
One process embodiment of this invention is performed by the steps of (a) soaking uncooked pasta in water having a temperature of between about 33.degree. F. (0.6.degree. C.) and about 140.degree. F. (60.degree. C.) for a period of time sufficient to hydrate the pasta; and (b) cooking soaked pasta resulting from the preceding step by heating for a period of time shorter than would be needed to cook pasta which had not been previously soaked. Starch loss from cooked pasta which results is less than about 7.0% by weight of the uncooked pasta.
In preferred process embodiments, the heating step may be accomplished either by microwave heating, or by immersion in hot or boiling water.
In other preferred embodiments, the pasta is packaged in individual portions, i.e., in water-permeable boiling water-resistant containers such as perforated plastic bags.
In an especially preferred embodiment, the invention relates to a process for preparing a fast-cooking pasta product comprising the steps of (a) soaking a portion of uncooked pasta in a perforated polyethylene bag, in water having a temperature between about 40.degree. F. (4.4.degree. C.) and about 50.degree. F. (10.degree. C.) for a period sufficient to hydrate the pasta, i.e., of between about 4 and about 12 hours, and (b) either subjecting soaked pasta to microwave heating or immersing soaked pasta in hot or boiling water for between about 1 and about 2 minutes to cook the pasta. The pasta preferably comprises semolina flour, water, optional glycerol monostearate, optional low temperature coagulatable protein, and optional sulfhydryl reducing agent. The process of the invention may be accomplished by selecting a pasta which, prior to the soaking step, was subjected to temperatures of at least about 180.degree. F. (82.2.degree. C.). Starch loss from cooked pasta which results is less than about 7.0% by weight of the uncooked pasta.
In another preferred embodiment, the invention relates to a process for preparing a fast-cooking pasta product, wherein the process comprises the steps of (a) soaking a portion of uncooked pasta in water having a temperature of between about 33.degree. F. (0.6.degree. C.) and about 140.degree. F. (60.degree. C.) for a period of time sufficient to hydrate the pasta, which pasta comprises semolina flour, water, low temperature coagulatable protein, an optional sulfhydryl reducing agent, and optional glycerol monostearate; and (b) either subjecting soaked pasta to boiling water or microwave heating to cook the pasta. Prior to soaking, the uncooked pasta is subjected to temperatures of at least about 165.degree. F. (73.9.degree. C.), as by drying. Starch loss from cooked pastas which result is less than about 7.0% by weight of the uncooked pasta.
In yet another preferred embodiment, the invention relates to a process for preparing a fast-cooking pasta product, wherein the process comprises the steps of (a) soaking a portion of uncooked pasta in water having a temperature of between about 33.degree. F. (0.6.degree. C.) and about 140.degree. F. (60.degree. C.) for a period of time sufficient to hydrate the pasta, which pasta comprises semolina flour, water, low temperature coagulatable protein, sulfhydryl reducing agent, and optional glycerol monostearate; and (b) either subjecting the soaked pasta to boiling water or microwave heating to cook the pasta. Prior to the soaking step, the pasta was aged for from about 3 to about 12 months. Again, starch loss is less than about 7.0%.
In still another embodiment, the invention relates to a shelf stable, microwave cookable, prepackaged pasta product containing uncooked pasta and sauce capable of preparation to a consumable, servable state by addition thereto of water, and cooking in a microwave oven.
The invention also relates to a pasta product comprising between about 70% and about 85% by weight wheat flour, between about 8% and about 23% by weight added moisture, between about 0.50% and about 2.50%, by weight, of a low temperature coagulatable protein, and a sufficient amount of a flavoring agent to cause the pasta product to retain the flavor after cooking.
The pasta product is neither precooked nor pregelatinized, and yet is capable of one-step preparation in a microwave oven. The flavoring agents may be lipid-based. Even when lipid-based flavoring agents are utilized, the pasta dough remains continuous and does not break down.
High temperature drying techniques, as referred to above, are the preferred method used to dry the pasta product, and such techniques result in a reduced loss of solids during the cooking of the pasta product.
The invention also relates to a snack food product which is made from the pasta dough as described above. The pasta dough is fried for a sufficient time so that the snack food product has a texture and consistency much like that of a potato chip.